The invention contemplated herein relates to an apparatus for applying a crease setting agent to a preformed crease in a textile article such as a pair of pants, a shirt or sheets, pillow cases and pleated items.
The application of such crease setting agents to a formed crease in a pair of pants takes place after the item is manufactured and a crease is pressed on the front and back of each leg. It is customary when applying such agents to reverse the garment or textile article to expose the inside of the preformed crease.
Similarly sheets, pillow cases and shirts could be made up and a crease preformed where desired whereupon the crease setting agent would be applied and then allowed to cure in a position where the crease is maximized or at its optimum. In a pair of pants this is accomplished by laying them out flat or in bundles on what is known in the industry as a pants horse. To form creases in pillow case, sheets and pleated items it is customay to make such items up into panels or portions of the finished item and crease these.
Early techniques at obtaining a crease comprised applying a pressing fluid to the garment before pressing and before it was creased. This concept was shown in French Pat. No. 852,737, corresponding German Pat. No. 683,680 and corresponding British Pat. No. 527,598.
Also Chemical Week of Jun. 20, 1973 includes an article titled "Sewing Up A New Market For Glue" wherein there is shown an adhesive hardener which permeates the fabric being joined. A crease like structure results.
A more current attempt to obtain a crease through the application of a crease setting agent is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,182,264 relating to an apparatus for forming a permanent crease by introducing an agent into a preformed crease.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,191,793 reexamined and Certificate No. B1 4,191,793 issued also is a similar effort at achieving a durable crease by applying a crease setting agent in a preformed crease.
In both of these U.S. Patents much attention is given to the applicator and providing same with various means for regulating the flow of agent but I have found that there are deficiencies in both these last mentioned systems.
Some of these deficiencies relate to the inefficiencies of the applicator as it takes a substantial time to dispense crease setting agent and it is difficult for the operator of the apparatus to align the temporary crease in the longitudinal slots or channels in the legs or rods fashioned to hold the textile article. If alignment is not accurate the formed crease is unacceptable, and the item is usually discarded as an irregular with a much lower sales price.
British Pat. No. 1,580,192 shows a method of forming a crease in a textile article where a stand includes a surface having a channel or slot adapted to receive the article to be creased. This Patent also has the drawbacks mentioned above.
British Pat. No. 1,472,852 relates to creasing a textile article but the technique is accomplished in a slightly automated fashion.
This last mentioned concept requires the use of an applicator having an indented peripheral surface which carries air back into the dispenser which can cause an air bubble to be deposited on the article thusly resulting in an uneven or unacceptable crease. A doctor member is thusly required and this adds to the complexities of the apparatus.
Finally a deficiency common to many of the above systems is the lack of constant application of the crease setting agent and the inability to control the direction of the agent, in a longitudinal direction as it is being applied to the preformed crease to thereby provide a textile article that is unacceptable. The result is a crooked crease either having too much or too little agent.
In order to overcome this deficiency and other drawbacks in the creasing arrangements known to me I have devised a system which fixes the applicator relative the rod and relative the inverted formed crease to provide an apparatus which would permit an operator to achieve a straight and uniform crease of a predetermined dimension.
This concept was the subject matter in my U.S. patent application Ser. No. 07/188,136 filed Apr. 26, 1988 now abandoned. The problem that resulted from this system was due to the general need to provide an applicator which was detachably mounted on a support and could be detached easily and therefore manipulated manually for touch up purposes.
I have found that with such a system there is a tendency for the operator to at times manually attempt to apply a creasing agent to the crease and you were then presented with the problems of the older type systems outlined hereinabove.
It is therefore an object of this invention to provide an apparatus for creasing textile articles which is efficient, compact and economical to manufacture and lacking in the above mentioned deficiencies and others.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus for creasing textile articles which permits adjusting width and straightness of the creasing agent to optimize the size of the crease to a highly acceptable degree and in an arrangement which permits both manual manipulation of the applicator and fixing said applicator so as to allow the operator to utilize the most efficient technique.
For a more complete understanding of the invention reference should be made to to the following detailed description of a preferred embodiment and to the accompanying drawings.